Jan. 23, 2009
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Contact: Brian McCann
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio - Cleveland State once again found too many obstacles to overcome on the road as the combination of a young team playing good basketball at home, a national TV crowd on ESPNU and the largest crowd in two decades all added up to host Youngstown State playing one of its best games in years, leading from wire-to-wire en roué to claiming a 64-60 victory over the Vikings on Friday night.
Cleveland State, which slips to 13-8 overall and 4-5 in league play, is just 1-3 on the road in league action. Youngstown State wins for just the sixth time this season (6-12) and improves to 3-6 in Horizon League action.
"You have to hand it to Youngstown State because they came ready to play and turned in a very strong performance," CSU head coach Gary Waters said. "We failed to get it done tonight. Every time we had an opportunity to take the lead, they were there to stop us."
J'Nathan Bullock led the Vikings with 19 points and a season-high 14 rebounds for his 15th career double-double while Norris Cole added 18 points. Cedric Jackson scored 11 points, but was an uncharacteristic two-for-six from the line. He added a career-high six steals with six assists and six rebounds.
Jack Liles led four YSU starters in double figures with 18 points while DeAndre Mays added 16 points, Sirlester Martin 15 points and nine rebounds and Kelvin Bright 10 points.
Although CSU never led during the contest and the game was tied just once, that coming in the first half, they were able to keep the deficit in single digits and challenged for the lead on numerous occasions on the night.
Trailing 60-52 with 2:23 left, CSU fought back.
A layup by Bullock and two free throws from Jackson cut the deficit in half. Bullock then had a chance to pull CSU to within two when he was fouled going to the hoop. The senior had made his first 10 free throws of the game, but missed the first of two free throws before making the second, pulling the Vikings to within 60-57 with 41 seconds left.
Liles was fouled at the other end and made one of two charity tosses to push the lead back to four, but a Jeremy Montgomery basket in the lane with four second left pulled the Vikings to within 61-59.
The Vikings fouled Mays on the inbounds and he converted the second of two free throws to push the lead back to three (62-59).
Following a YSU timeout, CSU fed the ball ahead to Cole, who was fouled just inside mid-court with 1.6 seconds left. He made the first of two free throws to make the margin two points. Immediately after receiving the ball from the official for his second attempt, he caught the Penguins napping when he quickly threw up an errant toss that hit the right side of the rim and bounced off the glass. Cole had moved into the lane on the toss, caught the ball and banked it in for the apparent game-tying basket, only to have it waved off because he had been called for entering the lane too early.
Forced to foul again on the inbounds, Liles made a pair of free throws to ice the game.
The Vikings struggled offensively for a third straight game, shooting just .379 from the field (22-58), including a two-for-17 effort from three-point (.118). YSU on the other hand rebounded from a .375 shooting effort in the opening half (12-32) by shooting .571 in the second stanza (12-21).
CSU did benefit from a strong performance on the boards as the Vikings out-rebounded the Penguins, 40-31, including 18-11 in offensive rebounds.
As has been the case during this three-game road trip, the Vikings were forced to play catch-up during most of the first half as CSU made just three of its first 19 field goal attempts in falling behind, 16-7 with 8:02 left.
Martin did most of the damage against the Vikings, scoring eight first half points.
But just like the other two games on the road, CSU caught fire to tie the game just before half but was never able to take lead, slipping behind, 29-25, at the break.
Trailing 21-13 with 5:33 left, CSU ran off six straight points, four coming on consecutive field goals by Cole with Bullock scoring the final two from the foul line, to close to within 21-19 with 3:50 remaining.
Jack Liles stopped the Viking run with a dunk inside, but driving layups from Bullock and Jackson knotted the game at 23 with 2:44 left.
Five straight Penguin points extended the advantage back out to five with 51 seconds left.
Bullock's performance allowed him to raise his career scoring total to 1,572 points, moving him into a fifth place tie on the CSU career scoring list with Theo Dixon, and his 14 rebounds raised his career rebounding total to 703, a total amassed by just seven other players in school history.
The second half saw CSU trail by no more than four points during the first eight minutes and had one opportunity to take the lead. Trailing 39-38 following a Jackson three-pointer with 12:18 left, the Vikings stopped YSU on its ensuing possession but promptly turned the ball over. The missed opportunity proved to be the last time in the game that it had the ball with an opportunity to take the lead.
The Vikings have the remainder of the weekend off before returning to action next week to open the second half of the Horizon League schedule at home against Detroit on Thursday, Jan. 29 beginning at 7:30 p.m. in the Wolstein Center.
